good afternoon from msnbc world headquarters in new york, welcome to alex witt reports. breaking news. new developments in the expanding man hunt for the gunman who killed brian thompson in new york city. today, mayor adams says police are making progress on day four of the search.

>> the manner in which they were able to follow his footsteps to recover evidence, some of it is known, some is unknown. but the net is tightening and we're going to bring this person to justice. >> do you know if police have a name for the suspect? >> we don't want to release that now. if you do, you're basically giving a tip to the person we're seeking and we do not want to give him an upper hand at all. let him continue to believe he can hide behind a mask. >> also new today, the nypd is working with local police in atlanta where the bus originated that brought the alleged gunman to new york last month. investigators are now analyzing a backpack found last night in central park they say might have belonged to the suspect. and new video of where police say the man was last seen on wednesday. a bus terminal in northern manhattan with connections across the northeast. we have reporters in place

covering all of these new, developing story lines. joining me now for the latest, george solis who's near the crime scene in new york city. what do we know? >> reporter: you heard mayor adams say the net is tightening. the mayor describing they want to individual not just off the streets of new york, but off the streets of america. as you mentioned, one crucial piece of evidence here they believe they have recovered from this person of interest is that gray backpack. we know the nypd team's using drone surveillance of central park to locate the backpack. what's in the contents, still not known, but so crucial in determining where this person may have gone or what was the motive behind this brazen shooting here in midtown manhattan around the holiday tree lighting ceremony. officials at the nypd not revealing too much about what they know even though online you

might see some chatter about who this official might be. officials tight lipped with good reason. the nypd sitting down with cnn to give us more context about where things stand. >> from there, we have him in a taxi cab going to 178th street and broadway, the port authority bus center. those buses are interstate buses. that's why we believe he may have left new york city. >> you said you have reason to believe he's no longer in new york city. >> we have video of him entering the port authority bus terminal. no video of him exiting so we believe he may have gotten on a bus. >> reporter: what you have now is a multistate, multiagency dragnet on the search for this person. that timeline so crucial of where this individual was last seen after the shooting here in midtown manhattan and after the appearance at the bus terminal. officials now believe that person of interest no longer in

crucial in this investigation. back to you. >> george, thank you so much. we're going to turn to former assistant director for intelligence at the fbi and msnbc national security analyst. frank, so earlier today, we just heard the mayor suggest they know the suspect's name but don't want to release it because they don't want to tip him off. what is your take on that? is that a good call and what do you think is next for this investigation that seems to be expanding far beyond new york? >> i'm so glad you're focusing on this. i've read the transcripts and they're perplexing because he's saying we know this guy's name but we don't want him to know so we're not going to say his name because we think that would give him an advantage. well, what mayor adams has essentially said today is we have his name and he's told the

suspect we have your name but we don't want to give you the advantage to tell you we have your name. so he's given him the tactical advantage. this is a head scratcher for me. i'm a big believer in crowd sourcing crime solving. the more you know, unless there are overriding tactical reasons, you should be sharing. if they have his name, that means they have all kinds of photos of him. a driver's license, social media photos. employment access badge photo. that's there. if they don't lay hands on him soon, you're going to see the photos come out that are crystal clear and could be matched using facial recognition. so this idea of not giving him an advantage by not saying his name is telling him you have his name. so where we go from here, i think they're very close. you've got everything from dna to perhaps partial fingerprints. that's probably a treasure-trove perhaps in that backpack that was recovered. and quite honestly, this guy's

been missing now for about two weeks. his friends, relatives, co-workers, they know he's missing. they know he's been leaking his grievances about this insurance company and someone is talking to the police at this point. >> and also, we may not know his name and we may not know who that guy is in the picture, but if you know that guy, you know who he is by that picture. that's a recognizable face if that's someone you're familiar with. you mentioned the backpack that was picked up in central park. it was taken to a crime lab. what results are they hoping to get and when do you think they're going to let the public know what they found? >> over the course of last few years, forensic science has advanced exponentially. the ability to pull dna off of items like this, you can actually find a match and develop a profile for dna in an

hour. that's that's. in an ideal world, maybe that backpack contains some writing. maybe he's telling us why he did this. maybe there's an id. maybe there's hair and fiber. they will be going over that in the laboratory all day and all night until they total exploit that forensically. >> they have his face, they say they have his name although they're not releasing it to the public. they seem to know how he left new york city. do you think they know where he is or is it just a matter of the u.s. is a large country and there's a lot of places that you could be tucking away in for a couple of weeks. >> so, i think there's, the very fact they've got detectives on the ground in atlanta is intriguing. we know the greyhound bus route started in atlanta but it's

notable we are hearing there are detectives on the ground in other locations. there's at least a dozen stops for that bus on the route up to new york. but yet, we're hearing they're in atlanta. i think that's significant. and again, the state of facial recognition in our country is really advanced. so the ability to match some known photo, again, once you've got a guy's identity, you put him in your facial recognition system, it's going to come up. it could be a photo on facebook from a birthday party but he's going to come up. so that indicates they're much closer to a location. >> always a constant fear of mine. facebook photos being searched by the police. the nypd says it's received hundreds of tips from the public and they're encouraging anyone with information to contact them. they're offering $10,000 as a reward and they're getting more than triple the amount of tips for this kind of case. is the department really equipped to deal with that many tips? running those down, sorting out

the people who want to be involved and the people who might actually know something. how do they do that and do they have the capacity to filter through all that and find what useful information might be there? >> latest information is that the fbi is involved and has added $50,000 in reward money. what's the significance? that capacity to handle thousands of tips through a tip line. that knowledge is there. the human resources are there at the fbi. and now they're looking for matches. so those people who answer the phones or the e-mails on a tip line, they're saying look, if you get anything that has to do with atlanta or whatever the detectives have developed, that goes to the top of the pile. and keep in mind there's also close coordination at united healthcare corporate security going over all of the complaint letters. the threatening e-mails. the phone calls. all of those are kept in a file so they're looking to cross reference with those threats. >> it's a lot to go to. frank, stay with us.

we've got more to cover ahead. now we're going to turn to -- headlines. president-elect trump is joining world leader for the reopening of the notre dame cathedral in paris. a fire nearly destroyed the landmark five years ago. now, this trip marks trump's first return to the world stage since winning the election. earlier, president trump sat down with president macron and they had a very fast, you know, on the moment there, meeting with ukrainian president zelenskyy. joining now is vaughn hillyard who has the very tough assignment there in paris, although it's been raining so i'll give you that. sources were telling me that this meeting was cobbled together kind of at the last minute. is that what you're hearing? how did this come about? >> reporter: hello, my friend.

we should note it is a little chilly and raining but this is a celebratory event and welcomed one to be covering here with the cathedral reopening. we should note president macron and president-elect trump just walked out about two minutes ago. but this is a major geopolitical moment as well. in terms of the extent to which it was planned to have all three of these leaders meeting at once, very unclear, but it would not be surprising that president macron was the orchestrater of this. because president zelenskyy upon leaving this meeting, he tweeted out and thanked macron for organizing it and zelenskyy was not an announcement to be attending this event until late yesterday afternoon here in paris. of course, president-elect trump, he decided multiple days ago to come and be a part of the ceremony here at the urging of president macron. this is of course a moment in

time that you know is not only one in which the french government finds itself in political turmoil with the collapse of its government and prime minister just two days ago, but for president macron, it is very important to have a good relationship with incoming president trump knowing that not only as macron heard the threats of donald trump to impose significant tariffs on all eu goods imported to the united states, but also this all comes back to zelenskyy and the nato alliance and the extent to which the united states and the trump administration will remain as committed to defending ukraine against the russian military as the biden administration as well as the macron government and nato has been for the last three years. those are the serious questions that of course will be at the foremost of concern for these eu countries here with president trump taking over just a month and a half from now.

>> thank you. it's a good day after a rough political week for president macron. he's got to be very happy that meeting came together. next, back to frank who's going to talk about why he worries that donald trump could grant security clearances without going through background checks. we'll be back in 90 seconds. bacu checks we'll be back in 90 seconds. ou e a gift like no other. a gift that can help st. jude children's research hospital save lives. i think it's the most worthwhile place to put your money when it comes to childhood cancer. if it weren't for st. jude, i wouldn't be sitting here today. if it weren't for st. jude, a lot of kids wouldn't be with their families every day. let's come together to help the children of st. jude fight childhood cancer visit this website, call this number, or scan the qr code with your $19 monthly donation. join with your debit or credit card right now, and we'll send you this st. jude t-shirt you can proudly wear to show your support.

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forum in california. austin and senate minority leader mcconnell are receiving peace through strength awards. courtney kube covers the pentagon for us and is at the security forum having much nicer weather than vaughn in paris. she joins us now. what is the deal with this forum? it seems it's meant to have a bipartisan nature. so what is the purpose of this event and why are these big whigs out in california? >> reporter: it's always intended to be bipartisan, but this year has a different feel. because most of the conversation is really about strength, excuse me, about peace through strength during a time of transition. so really about the transition in u.s. government right now. the panel's dealing from everything from china to iran to the crisis in the middle east, of course what's happening in syria, which has been developing extremely quickly on the world

stage. even talk about these meetings with president trump and president macron in paris. again, the real focus here is how is the transition going to go in all of these policy areas. how is it going to go when president-elect donald trump takes office in only a matter of weeks now. >> and i'm sure one of the hot topics of conversation has to be trump's pick for key national security post. especially tulsi gabbard. i was talking to a former top british intelligence official this week and former secretary of state and they were most concerned with gabbard for dni because of the access to the swath of u.s. intelligence she would have. what are you hearing? >> reporter: the majority of the conversation here sort of on the sidelines is really about the defense secretary nominee, pete hegseth. probably because this is more defense related but i have heard

talk about gabbard. particularly about the reporting nbc has done about this new letter, 100 former national security officials, bipartisan group of officials calling for congress to hold closed hearings to talk about gabbard. the goal here is to get some of this classified information that may not be able to be released in public to get that information to the senators and to the members of congress before they make a decision about whether to confirm her to the top intelligence position director of national intelligence. that has been a topic of conversation here and i have to say one of the things that people are talking about is all of the mystery surrounding her surprise visit to syria in january 2017. you know, at the time, she made some headlines with it. particularly when she came back and made these positive comments about al assad, even about the russian regime. but it's gotten more attention given what's happening in syria. this rebel group, hts, is

rolling towards damascus as we speak. it's unclear what's going to happen in that country. when you juxtapose that with the person who's potentially going to take over the intelligence apparatus for the united states, having these close potential ties with syria, that's a lot of topic of conversation on the sidelines. >> thank you so much. always on top of it. back with us now, former assistant director for counterintelligence at the fbi and msnbc's senior national security analyst. frank, another one of trump's picks is raising questions in an article, you argue particularly that kash patel's lack of adequate professional experience is the least of your concerns over him possibly becoming fbi director. there's been a lot of reporting over the last week about his view on national security including this enemies list he published in a book. why do you believe he's a dangerous choice for this post? >> look, it's a sad commentary that where we are right now or

at least where i am is that the least of my concerns is the lack of qualifications across many of these nominees. with regard to patel, it's his statements and his seeming blind allegiance to donald trump that concerns me the most. the idea that the fbi could be turned into an agency that's simply existing to pursue political enemies of donald trump, go after people, some of them my former colleagues, who simply did their job. and had been proven over and over again through inspector general investigations, special council investigations. even under republican administration, that they just did their job. and that there's no criminality associated with what they did. that's a problem. and so if that's what kash patel's all about, he's the wrong choice to head up the country's preimminent law enforcement and security agency. that's the problem. he's going to have to go through a confirmation process where he

can adequately answer that his allegiance is to the constitution and the american people and not to donald trump. >> all right, frank, we have to leave it there. thank you so much. next up, we're going to have a remarkable take on president biden's pardoning power. presido . ...or crohn's disemptoms after taking... ...a medication like humira or remicade? put them in check with rinvoq, a once-daily pill. when symptoms tried to take control, i got rapid relief with rinvoq. check. when flares tried to slow me down,... ...i got lasting remission with rinvoq. check. and many were in remission... ...even at nearly 2 years. and rinvoq... ...helped visibly reduce damage of the intestinal lining. check. rapid symptom relief. lasting remission. and visibly reduced damage. check. rinvoq can lower ability to fight infections. before treatment, test for tb and do bloodwork. serious infections, blood clots, some fatal;... ...cancers, including lymphoma and skin;... ...serious allergic reactions; gi tears; death;... ...heart attack; and stroke occurred. cv event risk increases in age 50 plus... ...with a heart disease risk factor. tell your doctor if you've had these events,

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we've got breaking news. the family of an american hostage taken in syria more than a decade ago is providing an update on what they say is his condition. ali, what are we learning about austin tice and how could the growing conflict in syria affect efforts to possibly bring him home? >> reporter: as we see the situation in syria worsen with anti assad rebels gaining ground at a record pace across that country, many are wondering about the stability of syria's government and how this could impact these talks and negotiations to release austin

tice, this freelance journalist, marine veteran, who was kidnapped in syria more than 12 years ago. his family was here in washington yesterday and his mother said at a press conference that they had heard from quote a significant source that austin tice is alive and being treated well by his captors, which u.s. officials have long said are assad officials and the assad regime is denying that. now, the family also yesterday met with national security adviser, jake sullivan, and they say that they hope that the unrest in syria that's still ongoing could potentially create this window of opportunity for austin's release. here's some sound from a press conference in which austin tice's brother spoke talking about his request of the biden administration. >> i asked him directly for a

commitment for president biden in his prior commitments and sentiments he's expressed about austin to reach out directly to assad on austin's behalf. i asked for that commitment explicitly directly and i did not receive it. >> obviously austin tice's family, i can't even imagine what they're going through right now. what we have been committed to is making sure that americans get home. 75 americans unjustly detained around the world. we have able to do that because this president's leadership. so i think that matters. >> reporter: saying that president biden over the last 44 days of his presidency up until january 20th will continue having these talks to release tice as well as other american hostages wrongfully detained across the world but the tice family is saying they were told in that meeting that they have to wait and see how the situation in syria pans out.

so obviously a terrible wait for this family that's still ongoing. >> thank you so much. now to a new report about president biden considering preemptive pardons on officials who could be targets of the incoming trump administration. this could include liz cheney, adam schiff and anthony fauci. some democrats are encouraging the move. >> jack smith name is on my list. liz cheney's name is on my list. i think that they all should be preemptively pardoned because i think there are people who trump may bring into this government who will go after these people in a serious way and there's no need to subject them to that. >> all right. joining us now is former democratic congressman from new york, mondaire jones, a lawyer and commissioner for the u.s. commission on civil rights. let me ask you. do you agree that doing these

pardons is a good idea? >> i think the incoming administration has shown a strong appetite to weaponize the department of justice including the fbi to go after donald trump's perceived political opponents. so let's just lay the foundation for this being an extraordinary moment in american history. for that reason, i think it is really important that joe biden, before he leaves office, strongly consider and move forward with preemptive pardons for people like liz cheney, dr. fauci, and others who would be unfairly prosecuted and investigated, which is an expensive process, by the way. law fair is what a lot of folks call it. this is the real weaponization of the department of justice that republicans have been claiming falsely. now they're prepared to do. >> does this kind of feed into the republican narrative that these people have done something wrong? by pardoning them, aren't they

going to point to that and say see, they did need pardons, they are criminals, they did something worthy of prosecution. >> republicans may say those things but of course we're only in this situation today because of the active disinformation and misinformation campaigns around people like dr. fauci and liz cheney who have done nothing wrong. certainly nothing illegal. >> i want to talk to you about president biden making the decision after saying he wouldn't to pardon hunter biden and give him this sweeping ten-year pardon. clyburn agreed with manchin who said he understands the move but suggested president biden should go further and pardon donald trump of his federal charges to quote, make it more balanced. what's your take on that? i can see by your face. >> it has no logical basis. we're talking about hunter biden, who was charged with crimes an average citizens would never have been charged with.

it was only because of his relationship to the president that he was pursued in the first place. and you've got kash patel, the potential future head of the fbi and pam bondi, who looks like she's going to sail through confirmation to be the next attorney general of the united states. both on the record saying they're going to go after hunter biden. called him out by name repeatedly. so i think this is an example of someone who needed a pardon to avoid the weaponization of the department of justice and fbi being brought to bear on him. >> later this month, democrats are going to decide who takes the top jobs on house committees and there seems to be a push to hand the gavel to the next generation. it was a big issue in the past election. we've got 35-year-old congresswoman cortez. she announced she's running to be the top democrat on oversight against connolly. that position became available

after jamie raskin put in his bid for the top position on judiciary, which you sat on. and that, he's going after 77-year-old jerry nadler agreed to step down. basically, there's a big chasm here. i usually cover foreign policy and lately it seems more glaring when you go to these world events and the american leaders are like aging on the foreign leaders by 20, 30 years. does there need to be a passing of the torch? >> i got elected to congress when i was 33 years old. >> you're making me feel very underachieving but please continue. >> i joined people who typically get there in their 60s and 70s and that's especially true among democrats in congress. i've noticed. even the republicans do a better job of electing younger people. the new generation. >> why is that? why are republicans doing a better job of electing young

leaders? isn't it supposed to be a democratic thing? >> great question. i didn't wait my turn when i ran for congress. to start out as a primary challenger then became an open seat. but sometimes you've got to sort of create a path for yourself. because people who have been holding this positions for a really long time are certainly not going just step aside voluntarily in many instances. >> i think we've seen that. >> having said that, i think there's tremendous value when someone has been serving for a long time and who has developed significant expertise. you know, when i was there as is true now, probably even more in a significant way, there is an appetite among some of the newer members for newer generations of leadership to take helm. >> thank you so much for being with us. >> thanks for having me. and donald trump says bonjour to paris but why? we'll have those answers next. by we'll have those answers next.

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breaking news from paris where donald trump is wrapping up his first overseas trip as president-elect. a short time ago, he departed a ceremony filled with world leaders and dignitaries to mark the reopening of notre dame cathedral. this came after a high profile meeting with president zelenskyy and president macron. he also praised his relationship

with macron ahead of their one-on-one meeting. >> it's an honor to be here. we had a good time together and we had a lot of success. really great success working together on defense and offense, too. it seems like the world is going a little crazy right now and we'll be talking about that. thank you very much for being here. >> joining us now is laura, a foreign correspondent for french and usa papers and a former spokesperson for macron. when i reached out to sources at the palace and said why is donald trump there, the response was he really likes notre dame or he really likes france. what is your take on this? why was he there in such a prominent position? >> you know, that's a very good question. i think he was there because there's a war going on in ukraine. president macron wants to be the

best friend of america this month and of president-elect donald trump and donald trump thinks that he has a special relation with president macron. they knew each other for a long time. trump call him when he was elected in 2017. then he went to paris to witness military on july 14th and president trump thinks that president macron understand where his spirit. now do they agree on everything? no. but at the time, at this troubled time for europe, i believe president trump think president macron, he's a good ally in europe and you need good allies in europe at this moment because the ukraine war is extremely sensitive. >> yes, it seems like this was a pretty good day for president macron after a rough week.

he's facing calls to step down after the government collapsed. you mentioned this moment at the military parade, but previously, he and trump had been at lagger heads and trump had said some not nice things then they had this magical bromance moment. what is the status of their relationship now? you talked about it a little bit and do you think macron is looking to be the link between the new second trump administration and europe, which as you mentioned, is really important. >> so to begin to answer the part of your question, yes, president macron in my believe and all the people who know him well think he wants to be the european leader who is going to speak all the times, be a type of, kind of mediator for president-elect donald trump.

again, there's a good and sensitive relation between the two men. when president macron on 17, president trump called him and spent 20 minutes on the phone with him to tell him how he was impressed by his campaign. then after, there was a sensitive issue and specifically with iran deal that totally disagree and president macron always said i think i can speak directly to president trump. regarding to what i know, president-elect trump like the fact that he speaks directly in english with no trump's letter to president macron. this is a direct relation he likes to have with an elected leader. on a more serious note, again, ukraine is a very problematic thing in europe at this moment. they want to find a solution and are trying to set up something. we might be surprised to see what's happening.

it's the third time that president-elect trump has spoken with president zelenskyy. president zelenskyy was not expected this week at the beginning of the week in paris. then he came. we don't know at all what happened when they spoke. president macron, president-elect trump, and president zelenskyy together. it was small talks. but again, something is moving and again, ukraine at this time is very, very sensitive issue for all the europeans and all the europeans know that with president-elect donald trump and his new administration, ukraine is going to be very different than under the biden administration. >> what are you hearing very quickly about how this meeting came about? sources familiar telling me it was very last minute. it went 45 minutes, which is longer than it was supposed to and the feedback i'm getting is it was good for ukraine. do you think that's probably true just the fact they got these three men in the same room

together? >> absolutely. it was like a peace summit with again, macron a mediator trying to do something for ukraine. this is an obsession in france because france is closer to russia an to ukraine than the united states and the french diplomats know that it's going to be very different after january 20. let me tell you, also, which is really important. again, president macron wants to be the mediator in chief at this moment on different issues and it was a surprise because as you said previously, there's a terrible political crisis in france so at least today it was peace. >> thank you so much. coming up, what cosplay, elon musk, and vivek ramaswamy have in common. at least according to one member of congress. we'll have that next. accordingr of congress. we'll have that next open. ♪♪ ♪♪

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all right. we're going to go to florida congressman maxwell frost who had interesting comments on elon musk and vivek ramaswamy's visit to capitol hill this week. >> let's with honest about doge and this whole thing. it's a joke. we're talking about two billionaires who are cosplaying as government officials. it's an x account right now. >> joining us now, lexi mckinnon

and megan hayes, former special assistant to president biden and his former director of message planning. do you agree with congressman frost? is this elevated cosplay and what do you think the message is when these two come to capitol hill? what are they trying to send? >> unfortunately, i don't agree and i think that although it's a committee that exists outside of official government, they are still two very influential figures in donald trump's orbit. elon musk is referred to by many as the so-called shadow president. he's been by trump's side through the election and since he won the election. they just sat down at the aspen institute and ramaswamy said when it comes to legislation, the voters have decided by electing who they've elected to

congress. >> i want to point out, musk was also in paris today with donald trump and the world leaders. >> exactly. no, no, exactly right. yes, the committee might not be legitimate but those two figures are influential and will be the ones directing a lot of what trump asks republican lawmakers to do. >> dismiss at your own risk. megan, republicans are saying hard decisions are ahead and they plan to bring democrats in to discuss cuts to social security, medicaid, medicare. is this a nonstarter? are democrats going to be open to any of these conversations? >> i think they're going to have to take a holistic look at the budget including defense spending and other entitlement programs. i know doge is looking at the civil servant so i think they're going to have to look at these

programs if they want to cut and democrats are going to have to work with republicans in the next congress to get things done. i'm not sure they are going to cut social security. i don't think that's popular for democrats or republicans but we'll see what happens. >> you know, you've got these somewhat sacred programs. defense spending, especially for republicans, tends to be the other one up there with social security and other benefits but it's also very costly and a big part of the budget. however, it's not listed overtly as a doge target. elon musk owns several companies are federal and defense contracts. do you think bringing defense spending into this conversation could change by the inclusion of democrats like jared moscow witz joining the caucus? >> we've seen democrats on these committees going after elon and asking for more transparency

because of the sheer number of contracts he has with starlink and other parts of his businesses. he's gaining more power even though he's not technically an elected official and you couple that with those federal contracts he already has. you think about how much power he's trying to accumulate by his proximity to trump and others in government. i think it's going to be tough for democrats to hold him accountable or make changes to those federal contracts but i would expect at the least, we will hear from democrats calling for more transparency and a review of what those contracts actually look like and should look like moving forward. >> do you think trump's base, the people who voted for him, if you're looking at older, largely white middle americans, a lot of them are dependent on these programs. do you think they want cuts to these programs? is that what trump voters are looking for? >> no, and megan mentioned earlier how popular these

programs are. it is difficult to find consensus on any issue but 80% of americans agree they don't want social security benefits for example to be cut from any sort of plans that elon or president-elect trump have. the problem of course is that trump has slipped on this issue so no one totally knows where he stands when but if it comes down to it, we have heard how ruthless elon musk and vivek ramaswamy want to be when it comes to cutting spending. we know they will do whatever it takes to make trump happy. >> all right, megan, trump's defense secretary pick, pete hegseth, but back on capitol hill this week. his mom even went to stump for him on television, which might be a tactic i'll try my next job interview. and senators asked about his alcohol consumption. are republican senators likely to support his nomination now that trump has declared he thinks he's doing well?

>> no, i think they're still going through the process with all these meetings. i think joni ernst is a big person they'll be looking to. but i don't think that people are just going to blanket hegseth getting this nomination through just because trump said. i think there are a lot of problems. not only his character problems but the fact he does not have the ability to do the job. they've talked about how he ran two veterans programs into the ground and he doesn't have the experience to run dod. they're going to take these meetings very seriously. it's an extremely important agency. i don't think he is just going to get a rubber stamp because this is who trump wants. >> there seem to be more palatable candidates waiting in the wings. alexi, speaking of nonpalatable

candidates, one of the other more controversial picks is tulsi gabbard. officials wrote a letter saying they were alarmed about her leaking intelligence to places it shouldn't go. why is she such a concern and do you think she's going to make it through? >> because of her close relationships with certain foreign leaders and again, how she handles or maybe mishandles certain type of classified or sensitive information. you put that on top of someone like president-elect who we know does not take seriously the handling of classified documents an is willing to share things with people to curry favor in different ways. so those two together is an alarming combination to folks who want to protect america's national security interest. >> thank you both so much for being with us and that will do it for this edition of alex witt

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